| About the Mankiw criticism, I direct you to the answer from people more knowledgeable that me [1] About the stagflation I recognize that I have not looking enough into it (yet) to be able to have a meaningful debate. About Japan, your comment: "the BOJ refused to print money for 20 years" puzzles me. The public debt of Japan is, currently, around 240% of GDP, and around half of it is owned by the BOJ. If that's not your interpretation of "printing money", what is it? I don't understand neither your comment "[..] no inflation when all the governments of the world [..] at the same time". Are you making a reference to the external sector aspects of inflation? You say: "[..] debt spending [..] We disagree with the idea that it's an unlimited tool with zero repercussions." Please, note that MMT doesn't say that. MMT says that excessive deficits can be inflationary in a problematic way, what MMT disagree is that public debt (the accumulate of past deficits) is problematic. Finally, thanks for engaging in this discussion. It seems to me that it's reasonable that people disagree in policies, because policies come from values and those can be very different. What we should be able to agree is in how the financial system currently works. MMT have some policy proposals but that's not the important thing, the important thing is that the description of how the system works is different and, should be falsifiable. Sometimes, in this kind of exchange, I despair because it seems the other person and I are talking past each other. I think I found your webpage, would you be willing to continue this exchange by mail? I have some problems understanding what is what the MMT critics don't understand. In the worst case scenario we will finish with a better understanding of the other position. [1]
- http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=43900
- http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=43961
- http://bilbo.economicoutlook.net/blog/?p=43997 |